Baking, crafting, mama-ing and taking photos of it all. When I remember.

Category Archives: health

Once upon a time I was a middle school aged kid who ran track for about a week’s worth of practices and then decided I haaaaated it and never ran again.

Until about a year after my second baby (HBear) was born. In 2013, I started regularly exercising for basically the first time in my adult life and it was great – I lost weight, I was fit and strong, I felt good about my physical presence in the world. The kids were still little enough that I could put them in the double jogging stroller and run around Back Cove. (I totally got high fives from big burly dudes when I did that.) My work schedule was literally half what it is now, so I had time to run. And, importantly, I lived within a few blocks of a fabulous running trail. (I no longer do.) However, after about a year and a half of running, I had a recurrence of plantar fasciitis. I’d had it before and the doctor told me to wear super supportive shoes (hello arches!) and it went away pretty quickly. This time, I tapered off my running until June 2015, when I did the Color Run in South Portland on a very cold, raining, miserable day. (It was a lot of fun, despite the weather – until I got back to my car after the race and could barely get my keys out because my hands were stiff and frozen.)

Good times, y’all.

But that was the last time I ran. Until yesterday.

Over the past two years I’ve focused on my shoe choices, getting various inserts for said shoes, seeing my doctor, doing stretches, wearing stretchy foot braces, doing certain exercises for my feet & calves (which seemed only to exacerbate the problem) and, finally, wearing this stupid looking sock to bed every night. Very little seemed to help, except for that damn sock. (It is super sexy. And so comfortable. *insert eyeroll here*) I’ve been using it nearly every night since early May and gosh darn it if I can’t actually walk around (almost) pain-free now. HALLELUJAH.

But this means that for the past two years, I’ve been fairly inactive. Recommended “treatment” for plantar fasciitis involves staying off your feet as much as possible, which is…unrealistic for a mother of two small kids. But I’ve tried. No running. I still walked but not great distances, except occasionally. My two years of inactivity definitely shows. I’ve gained back all the weight I was so proud of losing before. I’m not nearly as fit or strong or physically capable as I was. It has been intensely frustrating to finally get to a point where I felt good about myself, only to slip all the way back. I tried to find ways of working out that didn’t bother my foot but it was very difficult – even yoga hurt, due to going barefoot.

So I took a small first step yesterday and did the first day (again) of C25K. I can honestly say something I never thought I’d say: I’ve really missed running. We’ll see how it goes…

I was home today with a wretched cold and after going back to bed at 9 I slept until 1. 1! I can’t believe I did that. I can’t a) remember the last time I took a sick day and b) remember the last time I took a 4 hour nap. Unheard of!

I wish I could say I felt better after that but I didn’t.

At least I was well rested when the kids came home and climbed all over me…

After the day we had, I ordered pizza. It wasn’t bad, exactly, just long and tiring… E & H didn’t fall asleep until nearly 10 last night and then H was up at 5:30 this morning and proceeded to not nap the entire day. Oy. We were supposed to have a play date with some friends but the littlest had a fever so the oldest got dropped off at our house for a solo play date sans parent & sibling. No big deal, really, just not what we were expecting. E had dance class so we saw more friends, knitted and talked about how tired we were. Heh.

By the time we got home H was having a rough time with life and I scrapped our homemade dinner plans in favor of spending time with them and having pizza delivered. Win win.

We had a play date today with a friend who was really excited to have us over to her house a while back but markedly less excited to come to our house. It’s totally just her being 4 and not quite comfortable here (she has a hard time with new things) but I still felt bad.